Alex (In the Company of Snipers) (14 page)

“Sweetheart.” His voice was softer this time, more air than strength, but it still commanded. “You’re ... not ... him.”

She heard. She just couldn’t stop. She had to do this one thing for Tommy, for Jackie.
Don’t make me stop. Not now. Don’t you understand?

“Kelsey.” He sank to his knees, his eyes still riveted to hers as he swayed back and forth. With a soft groan, he fell face first into the dirt.

“Alex.”

Just like that, the fog of madness dissipated. Her brain stopped churning. In a second, she scrambled back to him and pulled him onto her lap.

He whispered to his dogs. “Hold.”

Whisper and Smoke latched onto the child-killer’s throat while Nick vomited and cried.

“You’re hurt. You’re shot.” She leaned into Alex’s face. In a rush of tears and anguish, she blurted out what he already knew. “He killed my boys, Alex. He killed my boys.”

“I know, honey. I know.” He wiped a bloody thumb across her chin, but his strength was gone. His hand dropped into hers.

She pulled his shirt open. Blood oozed from an ugly hole under his left collarbone. In a minute, she wiggled out of the pink T-shirt, ripped it in half, and pressed one piece against his shoulder and another at the hole in his back. He groaned while she cried.

“We need to get you out of here.”

The blood kept coming. Within seconds, the pink fabric was drenched in red, and she was scared. “I don’t know what else to do. There’s so much blood. What should I do?”

But instead of telling her what to do, Alex looked at her bra.

“In another place and time—” He tried to joke, but his voice was too weak, his face too gray. Blood trickled down his neck. “My phone. Press one ….”

Kelsey fumbled his cell phone out of the holster on his belt and speed dialed his office. It was a roundabout way to go, but it worked.

“Alex?” A man answered on the first ring.

“He’s hurt,” she cried out. “He’s been shot. He’s hurt.”

“Kelsey? Alex is shot?” the man asked. “Is he alive?”

“Yes, but he’s bleeding, and I can’t stop it, and I don’t know what to do.”

“Calm down,” he said firmly. She heard him turn to talk with someone else before he came back on the line. “Help is on its way. Are you hurt?”

“No, I’m just ….” She looked down at the man in her lap. “But he’s dying,” she whined. “He’s dying. I don’t know what to do. Please. Help me.”

“Listen. My name is Murphy. Talk to me. Where’s he shot, honey?”

“In his back. It came out the front of his shoulder. There’s a lot of blood,” she explained quickly.

“They’ll be there in five minutes. Five minutes, I promise. You just stay with him and keep talking to me, you hear me?” Murphy sounded scared, but she couldn’t hold the phone and Alex, too. He had passed out, and she was scared he would die right there under the trees. She gathered him into her arms and dropped the phone.

Memories poured over her. She cried. With death so close, the sweet faces of her boys came to her mind. She saw them crying for her while dark cold water swirled around them. Tommy never liked water in his face, and now ... and now ....

She choked. The thought of their final moments suffocated her. They had suffered. Alex groaned against her neck. They had cried for their mama. His blood trickled down her elbow. He was dying in her arms. Everything was mixed together as Kelsey prayed for Tommy, Jackie, and Alex. Somehow they were all connected. She hadn’t saved her boys, and now, she couldn’t save him. Like his blood in the dirt, everything good was spilling away from her.

Alex

Where the hell am I?

Alex pulled the nasal cannula off his face. The monitor next to his bed beeped with stats of oxygen saturation, blood pressure, heart rate, plus a dozen other things he didn’t care about.
Shit. I’m in a hospital.

An IV line hung from the metal tree by the
bed. Its line snaked around the rail and taped to the back of his hand. Several more tubes circled out of his chest.
Those have to go.

But the worst indignity of all, he was catheterized and he knew it.
That definitely has to go. No bag of pee hanging off my bed.

He ached, but not too bad, all things considered. He had felt a lot worse.
Some vacation.
Fragments of the last few days edged their way back into his head.
Kelsey. That bastard husband of hers shot me. Damn. She knows.

His groggy mind relived the bullet’s impact and the look in Kelsey’s startled eyes. The frightening image of her rage came back to him. Thankfully she listened and remembered who she was, that she really didn’t want to kill her worthless husband. She had ripped her pink shirt off to staunch his bleeding. He thought it funny all recollection stopped there. He smiled. That was actually a pretty good place to stop being held in the arms of a half-naked angel. A man couldn’t ask for a better way to die.

The room was quiet except for the sounds of the hospital machines and his steady breathing. Sometimes it’s nice to just listen to your own breathing. This was a good day. He wanted to sit up. Heck, he wanted to check the hell out of this place, but it had taken too much effort just figuring out where he was.

Gradually, his head cleared. He noticed Kelsey sound asleep in the chair beside him, her head resting on her folded arms on the edge of his bed. He smoothed his hand over her cheek. She sighed as a small smile pinched her lips. Another memory surfaced through the meds.
She prayed for me.
That kind act humbled him. Nobody’d prayed for him in years unless it was for him to die. He remembered something else. She glowed?

She looked peaceful, her hair tied back in a ponytail. Somewhere along the line, she had borrowed a nurse’s gray shirt. Scrubs. That’s what they’re called. He traced his thumb along the line of her jaw, but she didn’t stir. He wished he could pull her into his arms. He knew he would sleep a lot better then. They both would. He closed his eyes.

And hoped she would stay.

Ten

Alex

People still surprised him.

Everyone turned out for the funeral of Tommy and Jackie Durrant. The tragic story had a powerful effect on the town where Kelsey lived. In an instant, they took the long-suffering mother into their hearts. They wanted her to know they cared. Too late maybe, but they cared.

Alex walked through the cemetery dressed in his grey suit, white shirt, and black tie and his black trench coat pulled over the sling on his arm. It was funeral attire, somber dress for a somber day. Murphy had overnight expressed it.

The police had informed Alex that Durrant’s confession corroborated what they already knew. His only motive for murdering his children was that he was sick and tired of two bloodsuckers in his life and their ungrateful mother. He claimed Tommy and Jackie weren’t his. After that outrageous statement, the medical examiner ran DNA testing. The boys were Durrant’s all right. Kelsey wasn’t what he had claimed, but he was a murderer and not a very bright one at that. He had left a trail of evidence the police had no trouble following.

Alex saw Kelsey, a slender wisp of a woman in a simple black dress at the graveside with the minister. For the first time, he noticed her long legs. The road rash on them was concealed beneath black stockings ending in low black heels. She stood staring at the docile minister in front of her, her expression as vacant as his. No soft sweet laughter graced her face. She looked lost, the biblical leper everyone looked at and talked about, but nobody really knew. The only things missing were the stones.

Alex couldn’t get to her side fast enough. The minister asked everyone to take their places for prayer, so Alex halted where he stood, just a few yards behind her. The minister gave Kelsey his blessing. The righteous man told the grieving mother how Tommy and Jackie were in a better place. She should be thankful their earthly journey was completed because now she had two little angels in heaven watching over her. He challenged her to live in such a manner that she would be fit to join them someday.

Alex heard her whimper. His own heart screamed,
“Bullshit. There’s no better place than with their mother.”

With a closing prayer in her behalf, the graveside ceremony concluded. A crowd of well-wishers, do-gooders, and a couple local news reporters engulfed her, their murmurs of understanding and compassion a quiet buzz of hot air. She stood just beyond his reach, her eyes locked on the small oak box that now held the two little brothers for eternity. An elderly couple turned to introduce themselves, but Alex adeptly passed them by, his eyes only for Kelsey.

She trembled, her hands to her mouth.

One more step.

She shook as the reality of the day depleted what little resolve she had brought with her.

Yet another step, and he took her gently by the elbow. Kelsey turned to him with a blank look that registered no recognition. “What am I supposed to do now?” she asked, her voice eerily calm.

He pulled her against him, not caring if it hurt his shoulder or not. “Whatever you need to do, honey.”

“I don’t know.” Dazed brown eyes returned to the casket. “I don’t just leave them here alone. Do I?”

He didn’t speak. She had spoken his sentiments exactly, only four years later.

Kelsey took a step toward the oak box, her hand outstretched. “I can’t just go. I mean, how will they … where will I ….”

“Where’s your sister, honey? Where’s Louise?” Alex panned the audience. The woman he thought might be her sister was still engrossed in a serious conversation with the minister.

“Am I supposed to walk away? Is that what I should do?”

The incredulity in her voice stabbed his heart. He couldn’t answer.
Yes, Sweetheart. Now you’re supposed to go on living, as if you still have a reason to. Walk away. Leave them behind. They have to stay. You have to go. The sun will come up tomorrow like nothing happened here. Everyone will get on with their lives while you forever wish that you lay in the grave, too.

“Alex?” She clutched his sleeve, insistent that he respond. “Tell me. Am I supposed to leave, too?

“Yes.” There, he said it. The awful truth was spoken. “But I’m right here with you, Kelsey. You’re not alone.”

“But, I can’t.” She leaned her forehead into his shirt, her hands clutching the lapels of his coat as she unraveled. “I should’ve been there. I should’ve been there.”

All he could do was stand and keep her from falling. Louise was at his elbow, but Kelsey was past consolation. He guided her to a nearby chair, hoping to make it before she collapsed. Within the silken curtain of her hair, she sat with her face buried in her hands, her pain whining out of her in an escalating crescendo.

“He … he wouldn’t let … he wouldn’t let me go with them.”

The local television cameraman leaned in for a close shot, but one scorching look from Alex and the man wilted. Alex shielded Kelsey with his coat and a curse. He pulled her to her feet, escorted her through the crowd, and into the rear seat of her sister’s rental car. He tossed his coat into the front seat and slammed the door behind them, cursing all stupid people everywhere who just wanted to see this fragile woman’s suffering.

Kelsey collapsed, half on the seat, half on the floor of the car, hiccupping sobs that wouldn’t stop. “I should’ve been there.”

“Come here.” Alex pulled her off the floor and onto his lap. The day was taking its toll on him, too. Too many memories had come back to life. Hot tears drenched his freshly pressed shirt. He didn’t care. His heart ached for this tender woman hugged up to him. He let her cry, wishing there was some way to help.

“You’re stronger than you know,” he whispered into her hair. Instantly he wanted to call his words back.
I sound just like the minister.

“No. I’m not.” She burst into more tears. He didn’t speak again. All he could do was hold her, let her cry, and wipe his own face. At last, the storm subsided.

“I … I don’t know … how you did it,” she murmured weakly against him.

“Did what, sweetheart?”

“I don’t know how you survived after … Sara and Abby. I don’t know how you did it.”

“What makes you think I did?” He gently massaged the back of her neck.

“But you did. You’re successful. You’re … you’re—” Tears took over again.

“One day at a time, Kelsey. That’s all. Just take one day at a time.”

A happier memory broke through the sadness.

“We—I had a birthday party for Tommy last November,” she whispered, biting her knuckles as the story unfolded. “He was so excited. I made brownies. He got chocolate frosting all over his face and in his hair and even in his armpits. He looked like a little chocolate boy.”

Alex choked. He had seen their pictures. The boys were smaller versions of their pretty mother. He gathered her hair over her shoulder in a ponytail and continued the massage down her back. She was thin and gaunt under her simple sheath dress, her backbone sharp beneath his fingers. She had lost weight. Skin, bones and grief, the woman felt like she was staged to fade away.

“Tommy was so happy when he was born. He came out of me smiling like he was glad to see me, or something.” She buried her face in his shirt. “I want him back.”